If there was ever a composer in the modern era from whom instrumentalists would hanker for a sonata or concerto, Richard Strauss must be right up there. His wide-ranging orchestral and operatic creations bleed with gloriously idiomatic writing for every instrument, and yet only the piano, violin, clarinet (in tandem with the bassoon), oboe and horn can really claim to have bespoke solo works from the composer’s seamlessly productive pen, and collectively they form only a small proportion of the ...